Posted: September 10th, 2021

1500 to 2000 words Read the case study and answer the following questions: 1) What are the advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system?

1500 to 2000 words

Read the case study and answer the following questions:

1) What are the advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system?

2) How will this POS system help the business gain competitive advantages?

3) What are the advantages of having a centralised database?

4) How could this POS system facilitate decision making?

Address the following points:

? Why do point-of-sale systems process business activities more effectively?

? Can the information be tracked manually in an effective manner? Why or why not?

? What types of questions could be answered effectively?

? How could the information be used to better manage the business?

5) Recommend telecommunication options for this POS system

Address the following points:

? Types of networks – LAN, WAN or MAN?

? Types of media? –Wired or wireless technologies? Which types of cables should

be used for wired technologies? Which types of wireless technologies?

6) What type of risks does the POS system bring and how to protect the business

against the risks?

Address the following points:

? Security

? Privacy

? Confidentiality

Your report will be assessed on the quality of your research and quality of report.

Discussion must be relevant to the case study business. Your report is to be in the style

of a business report.

Case study — Blooming with Technology

The use of information technology is needed by every industry size and type of business.

Small businesses can realize the positive effects through adopting technology. However,

small businesses often do not have the resources and expertise of large corporations to

implement information technology strategies. However, the benefits of technology for

small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are just as crucial to business operations and

strategy.

Consider Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery, located in Colorado. This small nursery

was like many other small businesses and garden centers. They used manual registers to

track and maintain its inventory as well as determine which products were realizing the

most profit. The profits from the nursery were either “negligible” or a loss. They did not

have access to useful operational data to effectively manage their business. For

example, they did not track or review the margins of individual products. However, they

believed that they needed to do something different for their $1M business operation.

Enter a new point-of-sale system (POS) in 2008 – Affordable Custom Essay Writing Service | Write My Essay from Pro Writers. The system allowed the owners to track

useful business data from the sales transactions immediately at the time of the sale;

eliminating the need for tracking sales manually. The system processes and stores data

from the sale while updating the inventory as well as compiling a sales history. This

eliminates reliance on manual entry of sales transactions and reduction of inventory

units for the items sold. POS systems provide much more than a cash register. These

systems provide more robust functionality in inputting, tracking, and distributing data to

provide useful information to operate and manage the business.

Accurate inventory data maintained by the POS helped with decision making. Decisions

on how many units of a product to order were no longer based on speculation about

current inventory units. Now, accurate inventory counts eliminate the guesswork on

how much to order, helping the business to operate on leaner inventory units. The

system’s reporting can provide the detail transactions for an inventory item, such as how

many were purchased, discarded, and sold.

The implementation of a POS system also confirmed that the owners did not know as

much about their business as they thought they did. As they reviewed reports from the

new system, they saw that some products were less profitable than they thought. The

more detailed cost reporting by item helped them to understand which products

contributed the most profit to the operation. Their new perspective of the “real costs”

provided the opportunity to shift production to the higher-profit items, thereby gaining

more profit. Prior to implementing the POS system, they simply did not have the time to

approach this level of decision making.

Knowledge of their detailed product costs helps them to price products more profitably.

Price changes can be implemented temporarily (for a promotion) or permanently and

still remain within acceptable product margins. The accurate and timely reporting of this

information assists them to be more effective managers of their business operations.

The ability of the system to process sales, inventory, and purchasing transactions

immediately reduces the need for data entry of paper information. The time savings can

be used for managing the business rather than mundane clerical functions.

The new system has expanded Four Seasons’ management control over employee

schedules to review and allocate labour expenses to specific departments and functions.

An additional benefit allows the owners to delegate more responsibility to the staff and

establish accountability. Instead of the owners establishing goals, they provide the

system’s data and ask staff to submit their sales goals for the next reporting period.

Ultimately, the information technology system creates a solid infrastructure to process

and report the businesses operations for the entire enterprise.

The garden centre is an excellent example of how technology can realize benefits for a

business. The ability for organizations to remain competitive and agile is crucial. These

systems allow organizations large and small to leverage business data to gain a

competitive advantage and operational efficiency.

1. Introduction:

Clear statement of purpose, clarity of methods and assumptions;

systematic approach to project.

5marks

2. Use of resources:

Application of relevant course concepts, tools and frameworks use of

evidences, engagement with the literature.

25 marks

3. Content:

? Balanced coverage of each of the important points,

? Richness of analysis;

? Flow of ideas;

? Validity of objectives,

? Use of own insight and originality;

? Feasibility of recommendations and implementation

Consideration

60 marks

4. Organization and Presentation:

Clarity of structure, quality of presentation, style and readability.

Title page, Table of contents, List of abbreviations and/or glossary,

Executive summary/abstract, Introduction, Body, Conclusion

Recommendations, Bibliography, Appendices

5 marks

5. Citation practice:

Appropriate citation of sources and evidences used.

5 marks

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